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Grace Hanna's avatar

Thank you Mack, this is really useful for me, a new starter (in September) to Substack. My favorite pinned post is really long ("What is a Soul"), but I wanted it to be comprehensive, given that when I have searched the topic I haven't found anything close to complete as what I have distilled and written! However, good point to aim for 7 minute reads, thanks again.

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Tina Marsan's avatar

Mark,

Not only do I find tremendous value in what your share but also in the example you set in the ways you share. I enjoy our simple interactions and look forward to growing our Substacks together!

Thank you for creating such valuable, shareable content!

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Mack Collier's avatar

Thank ya darlin’, very much looking forward to growing with you!

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Neela 🌶️'s avatar

LOL—Just last week, I caught myself writing this monster paragraph in my Medium article. I was like, "No way. The editor will call me out." The sweet spot is writing something informative but accessible.

Quick confession, though: I'm guilty of skipping those "time to read" indicators at the top of articles.

Also, I applaud people using subheaders.

Medium readers love those.

Thank you for the mention, bro.

Hope you are having a good Wednesday!

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Jack Westerheide's avatar

I’ve personally found some success in shorter paragraphs. Especially on mobile, the shorter paragraphs make long form storytelling more manageable to read and understand.

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Mack Collier's avatar

I am trying to do a better job of using shorter paragraphs, I do think they help readability.

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Jana's avatar

Great post! I can relate to audio; I just don't want to do it. But I can see so many benefits as to why its a good idea.

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Mack Collier's avatar

Hi Jana. Funny, I had the same mentality toward newsletters for the longest time 😆. I did a podcast for years and it was fun but I didn’t like doing it every single week which is what needs to happen to build an audience. But here I can slip in an audio track when I feel like it instead of feeling like I have to do one with every post.

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Barbara at Projectkin's avatar

Absolutely! AND every segment is a little different. Constantly experiment, but it's essential to track variations and results... otherwise you're on your way down the slippery slope of chaos — without realizing it.

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Mack Collier's avatar

Barbara that a great point about tracking results! And also changing one variable at a time if possible so you can more easily measure the resulting change!

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Nika Kotláriková's avatar

I like that GIF :D I remember when I watched a documentary about old movies.

At that time, it was exactly the most costly movie scene. :)

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Mack Collier's avatar

Hello darlin’! You’re comment wasn’t showing up for me before. That documentary sounds really interesting, I’d like to watch it, do you remember what it was called?

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Nika Kotláriková's avatar

It was a long time ago. I only knew that it was referred to Buster Keaton's movie.

https://www.tiktok.com/@kevinwatsonsound/video/7221595282822253829

I asked the ChatGPT. Maybe it could be this one? The Great Buster: A Celebration (2018)

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Mack Collier's avatar

Thank you for checking, Nika! I’ll look for it!

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